BlogHer - The Quiet Mind vs. Social Media - Comments

Everything Can Be a Spiritual Practice

mfmakichen — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 17:30:54 -0500

Hi JoyMama,

I love what you're saying here because I really believe that any action we take up with conscious awareness becomes a form of spiritual practice. I love the reflective, in the moment, approach you have to blogging. I'm so happy you shared your perspective on this.

Mary-Frances Makichen
www.makichenbooks.com
www.wordmedley.com

Different ways of being reflective

JoyMama — Mon, 20 Oct 2008 10:01:45 -0500

Barbara directed me over to this post because I recently did a Zen-themed post myself!

One of the reasons I started blogging was to give myself a forum for reflecting more at length about things that I wasn't managing to put into words anywhere else. I've been finding that there's a certain reflective discipline to it. Maybe it's not Zen, but some of my posts come from places that started as a present-moment kind of thing and then as I thought about those moments, I realized that the moment gave rise to other thoughts and other connections. Then when I share what the moment brought for me, other people chime in and make even more connections. Is that an unquiet kind of thing? Maybe, but there's reflection to it as well.

I don't Twitter, though. Not nearly as much reflective potential there, it seems to me.

Thank you for the food for thought.

Very nice thought

Therextras — Sun, 19 Oct 2008 20:13:38 -0500

Thank you for a worthy opinion.

Barbara H. Boucher, PT, PhD, OT TherExtras

The Quiet Mind vs. Social Media

mfmakichen — Sun, 19 Oct 2008 19:10:36 -0500

Sometimes I wonder if social media is the antithesis of a quiet mind. I’ve meditated regularly for over ten years. One of the things I strive for is being in the present moment without judgments about myself or anything going on around me. Yet in order to provide content for a blog or twitter you need to have an opinion about something. You must have content to share. That means finding something either interesting, relevant or funny enough to contribute—it’s a judgment call.

I’ve been wondering if there’s a way to share content that’s more zen like because sometimes, the truth is, I just don’t feel like I have anything to say. I want to connect with others but I don’t necessarily want to have to be pithy or relevant or full of valuable content. I just want to acknowledge the present moment—what other people are doing, producing or going through. Sometimes I think acknowledgement and connecting with others is just as important as valuable content.

What do you think?